All the Devils' hottest news, from notes to numbers to neutral-zone traps

Thursday, February 27, 2014

The Devils lead the Columbus Blue Jackets 4-2 in the third period of tonight's game at Prudential Center.

Devils right wing Damien Brunner played only two shifts before sustaining what the team is calling a lower-body injury 5:31 into the first period and will not return. Brunner appeared to injure his left leg when he fell awkwardly after a hit.

Devils captain Bryce Salvador left the game 52 seconds into the third period after being struck in the upper chest/collarbone with a Jack Johnson slap shot.

SECOND PERIODThe Devils began the second period on the power play after Columbus' Derek MacKenzie picked up an extra roughing minor in his wrestling match with Bryce Salvador after the horn to end the first period

The Devils managed only one shot on goal during the man advantage, though, and could not add to their lead.

Blue Jackets goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky made a good left arm save on Adam Henrique's shot from the left circle at 4:00. Bobrovsky made a right arm stop on Jaromir Jagr in front at 9:03.

Former Ranger Marian Gaborik cut the Devils' lead to 3-2 when he swatted in the puck after a scramble in front at 11:42. Artem Anismov's shot deflected up off Marek Zidlicky and then down off Ryane Clowe before Gaborik knocked it in.

That was the sixth goal of the season for Gaborik, who is playing his first game back from a fractured collarbone that sidelined him for 22 games.

Adam Henrique put the Devils back up by two goals, though, with a shorthanded goal with just 18.1 seconds left in the second period. After Travis Zajac was sent off for hooking Brandon Dubinsky with 33.9 seconds left in the period, Patrik Elias flipped the puck over the head over Blue Jackets defenseman Jack Johnson in the neutral zone and it settled down perfectly for Henrique, who moved in alone on Bobrovsky and fired the puck past him on the stick side for his second goal of the night and 16th of the season.

That was the second assist of the night for Elias.

The Devils outshot the Blue Jackets 13-8 in the second period. The Blue Jackets will still have 1:27 of power play time left to begin the third period.

FIRST PERIODThe Devils jumped out to a 3-0 lead by scoring three goals in a span of 2:45.

Ryane Clowe opened the scoring at 6:09 by snapping an eight-game drought. Andrei Loktionov fed Clowe for a shot from the inner rim of the right circle that goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky stopped with his right pad. The rebound came back to Clowe in the slot for a second shot that was blocked by defenseman David Savard. The puck came back to Clowe again, though, for a third shot from the slot that beat Bobrovsky to the blocker side for his fourth goal of the season.

Jaromir Jagr made it 2-0 with a power-play goal at 7:31. Patrik Elias fed rookie defenseman Eric Gelinas for the initial shot from the right point. Bobrovsky made a pad save on Gelinas' blast, but left a rebound to his right for Jagr.

Bobrovsky slid to his left to rob Jagr with a pad save on his initial shot, but Jagr calmly gathered the puck to the right of the net and tucked it in behind Bobrovsky for his team-leading 18th goal of the season and the 699th of his career.

The Devils' power play had been 0-for-12 in the last four games before the Olympic break after Gelinas was sent down.

Another power-play goal by Adam Henrique made it 3-0 at 8:54 Henrique deflected defenseman Andy Greene's straight-on point shot down and past Bobrovsky for his 15th of the season and first in eight games.

The Blue Jackets got a goal back, though, with Artem Anisimov scoring at 11:36 -- two second after a Columbus power play expired. Goaltender Cory Schneider would love to have that one back as Anisimov took a seemingly harmless backhand from the bottom of the right circle that somehow went in off Schneider on the short side.

This is the first game for both teams following the Olympic break.

With 23 regular season games remaining, the Devils sit five points out of a playoff spot and two points behind the Blue Jackets, who have won all three games between the teams this season (one in a shootout).

Cory Schneider made his seventh consecutive start in net for the Devils against Sergei Bobrovsky for Columbus.

Center Jacob Josefson and defensemen Peter Harrold and Anton Volchenkov are be the Devils’ healthy scratches.

There are several games for the Devils to keep an eye on tonight for the playoff race. San Jose at Philadelphia (7 p.m.), Chicago at the Rangers (7 p.m.) and Detroit at Ottawa (7:30 p.m.) are three biggest. The Devils trail Detroit and Philadelphia by five points each in the playoff race and the Rangers by six.

About

TOM GULITTI has covered the New Jersey Devils for The Record since 2002. Prior to that, he covered the New York Rangers for four years. Gulitti joined The Record in 1998 after six years at The North Jersey Herald News. He graduated from Binghamton University in 1991 with a Bachelor of Arts in Rhetoric-Literature.